Heart and Mind (Jan 2022)

Efficacy and safety of traditional chinese medicine combined with western medicine for the treatment of COVID-19: A systematic review and meta-analysis

  • Shanshan Tian,
  • Kai Yuan,
  • Yongbo Zheng,
  • Xuejiao Gao,
  • Xuan Chen,
  • Yingbo Yang,
  • Shiqiu Meng,
  • Lu Cao,
  • Le Shi,
  • Wei Yan,
  • Xiaoxing Liu,
  • Jie Shi,
  • Lin Lu,
  • Jiahui Deng,
  • Yanping Bao

DOI
https://doi.org/10.4103/hm.hm_10_22
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 6, no. 3
pp. 105 – 119

Abstract

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Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has rapidly spread worldwide. Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) was considered important by Chinese health authorities in the fight against COVID-19. This review systematically analyzed and evaluated the safety and efficacy of TCM combined with Western Medicine (WM) for the treatment of COVID-19. We sought to provide summary evidence for clinicians when using TCM. We searched for studies in PubMed, Web of Science, Embase, Medline, the Cochrane Library, China National Knowledge Infrastructure, and Wanfang Data from database inception to June 1, 2021. Overall, 31 studies (14,579 participants) were involved in the final systematic review, including 15 randomized controlled trials and 16 observational studies. TCM combined with WM showed main outcomes of a higher clinical efficacy rate (odds ratio [OR] =2.48, 95% confidence interval [CI] =1.90–3.24, I2 = 4%) and lower case fatality rate (OR = 0.31, 95% CI = 0.19–0.49, I2 = 80%) compared with WM treatment alone. No significant overall adverse events were found between TCM plus WM group and WM group (OR = 1.43, 95% CI = 0.63–2.23, I2 = 75%). Some larger randomized control trials would assist in defining the effect of TCM combined with WM on the treatment of COVID-19 complications such as cardiac injury. TCM combined with WM may be safe and effective for the treatment of COVID-19.

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